Meet The Performers

CSO Musicians

Robert Chen's activities as a soloist include performances with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Moscow Philharmonic, New Japan Philharmonic, Orchestra of the Komische Oper Berlin, and the Bournemouth Symphony.

Patricia Dash

CSO Musician since 1989

Percussion

Appointed to the CSO by Sir Georg Solti when she was just twenty-four, Patricia was born in Rochester, New York where she began her percussion studies at the age of nine. She received a diploma with honors and a certificate of merit from the Eastman School of Music’s Preparatory Department in 1979, and went on to earn a Bachelor of Music degree with distinction from Eastman in 1983.

David Taylor

Assistant Concertmaster since 1979

Violin - Assistant Concertmaster

Known to Chicago audiences as a versatile soloist, chamber player, and orchestral musician, violinist David Taylor joined the Chicago Symphony Orchestra as assistant concertmaster in 1979. Born in Canton, Ohio, in 1949, David began to study violin with his father at the age of four.

Susanna Drake

CSO Musician since 2006

Horn

Just prior to joining the CSO, Susanna performed regularly as a freelancer in San Francisco with the San Francisco Symphony, LucasArts Productions (recording movie soundtracks), the California Symphony and the Santa Rosa Symphony. She also has held various positions in other orchestras across the country.

Peter Conover

Librarian since 1998

Principal Librarian

Peter Conover joined the Chicago Symphony Orchestra as librarian in 1998 and was named principal librarian a year later. As an orchestral librarian, Peter has been involved with the Major Orchestra Librarians’ Association (MOLA), having served on the Publications Committee and as the editor of Marcato, MOLA’s quarterly newsletter.

Michael Mulcahy

CSO Musician since 1989

Trombone

Appointed by Sir Georg Solti, Michael is also principal trombone of Chicago’s Music of the Baroque and the Grand Teton Music Festival. His orchestral career began in 1976 as principal trombone of the Tasmanian Symphony. A year later, he attained the same chair with the Melbourne Symphony. He left Australia in 1981 to pursue a career in Europe, where he became solo trombone of the Cologne Radio Symphony.

Sarah Bullen

CSO Musician since 1997

Principal Harp

Appointed principal harp of the CSO in 1997, Sarah held the same position with the New York Philharmonic from 1987 to 1997. She began her orchestra career in 1981 as principal harp of the Utah Symphony and has been critically acclaimed as a soloist throughout her career.

Oto Carrillo

CSO Musician since 2000

Horn

Prior to joining the CSO, Oto held positions in the South Bend and Southwest Michigan symphony orchestras. He is on the faculty at DePaul University and at the Symphony Orchestra Academy of the Pacific (SOAP Festival) in British Columbia, Canada.

Hermine Gagné

CSO Musician since 2003

Violin

Born in Montreal, Canada, Hermine began studying the violin at the age of four with Jacqueline S. David. At nine years old, she entered the Conservatoire de Musique de Montréal and graduated in 2000 with honors. While pursuing a master’s degree under instructor Kathleen Winkler at Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music, Hermine was awarded the Sallie Shepherd Perkins Prize for Highest Achievement in Music.

James Ross

CSO Musician since 1979

Percussion

Jim joined the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in 1979. He made his solo debut with the Orchestra in 1986 in Milhaud’s Concerto for Percussion and Chamber Orchestra under Erich Leinsdorf. A member of the Grant Park Symphony from 1973 to 1978, he returned to that orchestra in the summer of 1993 as a soloist in Toru Takemitsu’s From me flows what you call Time.

Paul Phillips, Jr.

CSO Musician since 1980

Violin

Paul Phillips joined the CS0 at the invitation of Sir Georg Solti, bringing a wealth of experience acquired in Indianapolis and Detroit. He played in the Indianapolis Symphony for four years under Chicagoan Izler Solomon, and was a member of the Indianapolis String Quartet.

Kenneth Olsen

CSO Musician since 2005

Assistant Principal Cello - The Adele Gidwitz Chair

Kenneth Olsen joined the Chicago Symphony Orchestra as Assistant Principal Cello in 2005. A native of New York, Mr. Olsen is a founding member of the East Coast Chamber Orchestra (ECCO), a group of talented young musicians from orchestras and ensembles all over the country.

Vadim Karpinos

CSO Musician since 2001

Assistant Principal Timpani

Vadim Karpinos was appointed to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in 2001 by Daniel Barenboim. He has appeared as a soloist with the Chicago Symphony and at Roosevelt University, where he has been an adjunct faculty member since 2005.

David Sanders

CSO Musician since 1974

Cello

David began playing cello at the age of fourteen in high school in Miami, Florida, and made his solo debut eighteen months later with the Miami Symphonic Society Orchestra. He was a scholarship student at the University of Miami and Florida State University summer orchestra festivals, the Eastern Music Festival, and the London Symphony Institute.

Lei Hou

CSO Musician since 1997

Violin

Active as a soloist and chamber musician in addition to her full-time duty with the CSO, Lei was a member of the National Symphony Orchestra from 1991-1997 where she was appointed by Mstislav Rostropovich, then music director of that orchestra.

Richard Graef

CSO Musician since 1968

Assistant Principal Flute

Richard Graef holds a Bachelor of Music degree from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music and a Master of Music degree from Indiana University. He also attended the Aspen Music School and later traveled to Salzburg, Austria, to attend the Mozarteum Academy of Music.

Catherine Brubaker

CSO Musician since 1989

Viola

A graduate of the Juilliard School, Catherine was a student of William Lincer. Other teachers include Karen Tuttle and Masao Kawasaki. Catherine is a former member of the Dallas and Seattle symphony orchestras. She has served on the music faculty at Northwestern University, teaching orchestral repertoire for viola.

Mark Ridenour

CSO Musician since 1994

Assistant Principal Trumpet

Mark Ridenour is assistant principal trumpet of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. He was appointed to this position by Daniel Barenboim in 1994. From 2003 until 2005, he served as the Orchestra’s acting principal trumpet.

Visiting Artist
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Piano and Percussion
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Piano

Jorge Federico Osorio

Piano

One of the pre-eminent pianists of our time, Jorge Federico Osorio is internationally acclaimed for his superb musicianship and masterful command of the instrument. He has performed with many of the world's leading orchestras, including the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, Seattle Symphony, Concertgebouw Orchestra, Israel Philharmonic, Moscow State Orchestra, Orchestre Nationale de France, Philharmonia Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and the Warsaw Philharmonic. Mr. Osorio's concert tours have taken him to Europe, Asia, and North, Central and South America, where he has collaborated with such distinguished conductors as Bernard Haitink, Mariss Jansons, Lorin Maazel, Klaus Tennstedt, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, James Conlon, Luis Herrera, Manfred Honeck, Eduardo Mata, Michel Plasson and Carlos Miguel Prieto, among many others. American festival appearances have included the Hollywood Bowl, Ravinia, Newport and Grant Park Festivals.

In July of 2010, Mr. Osorio performed all five Beethoven Concerti with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra at the Ravinia Festival in back-to-back concerts. Chicagoclassicalreview.com praised his performances as "revelatory on virtually every level." Two months earlier, Mr. Osorio played Liszt's Concerto No. 2 with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra at Symphony Center to great critical acclaim. "With his sterling technique Osorio can roar through this beloved Romantic concerto with the best of them..." (Chicago Tribune).

In addition to performances in Berlin, Brussels, Dusseldorf and Stuttgart during the past few years, Mr. Osorio performed at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam and the Gewandhaus in Leipzig. He also gave recitals in Boston, the San Francisco Bay Area and Chicago, where he performed on the prestigious Bank of America Great Performers Series at Symphony Center. Recent seasons have included concerts throughout Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Mexico and Spain, and performances with the symphony orchestras of Chicago, Pittsburgh, Milwaukee, Puerto Rico, New Mexico, Louisiana, Memphis, Huntsville, Akron, Elgin and Florida (West Coast). Of Mr. Osorio's 2007 New York Lincoln Center recital The New York Times proclaimed, "the sweep and freshness of his readings made his performance impossible to resist."

A prolific recording artist, Mr. Osorio has recorded a wide variety of repertoire, including a Brahms solo CD that Gramophone hailed as "one of the most distinguished discs of Brahms' piano music in recent years." Other recordings by Mr. Osorio include Beethoven's Five Piano Concerti and Choral Fantasy, Brahms Concerto No. 2, and concerti by Chávez, Mozart, Ponce, Rachmaninov, Rodrigo, Schumann and Tchaikovsky. Piano Español, a collection of works by Albéniz, Falla, Granados and Soler, received glowing reviews internationally and has marked Mr. Osorio as one of the great interpreters of Spanish piano music in the world. Mr. Osorio's most recent recording is the Debussy Preludes (Books I and II) along with selected works by Liszt.

Recipient of several international prizes and awards, including the Dallas Symphony Orchestra's Gina Bachauer Award and the Rhode Island International Master Piano Competition, Mr. Osorio is passionately involved in the performance of chamber music. In addition to having served as artistic director of the Brahms Chamber Music Festival in Mexico, he has performed in a piano trio with violinist Mayumi Fujikawa and cellist Richard Markson, and has collaborated with violinists Ani Kavafian, Elmar Oliveira and Henryk Szeryng. He is also a dedicated teacher and is on the faculty at Roosevelt University's Chicago College of Performing Arts. Mr. Osorio began his musical studies at the age of five with his mother, Luz María Puente, and later attended the conservatories of Mexico, Paris and Moscow, where he studied with Bernard Flavigny, Monique Haas and Jacob Milstein. Additionally, he worked with Nadia Reisenberg and Wilhelm Kempff. Highly revered in his native Mexico, Mr. Osorio currently resides in the United States.

Artek, Cedille, Naxos, ASV, CBS, EMI & IMP Recordings
Steinway Artist

Please note: Biographies on the CSO website are based on the information that was most recently provided to the CSO by the artists or their representatives. More current information may be available on the artists' own websites or those of their representatives.